The Big Beginning

WARNING: This post contains moderately graphic Mommy content. If you aren't a Mommy who is used to talking about the stuff that comes out of your kid, then continue reading at your own risk! (it's really not that bad)

You might remember way way back when F and I had the discussion about being a big kid vs. little kid and he declared he was a medium kid. We still have that discussion just about every day, and at our house the holy grail of big-kid-dom is toilet training. He's determined to be a big kid, but has had ZERO and I *really* mean it, zip, zilch, zero, no interest in going potty.

We've read the books, we've practiced, we've watched the videos, picked out underwear, read more books, practiced some more, read more books, we've had random successes, tried going potty on a schedule, nothing's penetrated. F has been showing all the signs of being ready for months, but he summed it up very concisely just last week:

F, "No, Mommy, no potty. I LIKE diapers."

*sigh*

OK, so I'm not going to chain him to the potty, I'm one tough Mom but that's not really my style. So, I wait. And wonder how in the world I'm ever going to do this because my bag of tricks is empty. I don't sweat it too much knowing that a lot of boys aren't ready until they're 3 (tick tock tick tock...) Then I contemplate running away for a long spa weekend while I let Travis figure it out.

Thursday, we had what I call a 'random' potty success, I knew he was about to have that daily 'constitutional' so I plopped him on the potty, hooray! Everyone's happy. But the rest of the day is status quo, diapers as usual. However, Friday...F walks up to me and states, "Mommy need go pee pee in potty RIGHT NOW."

What?

And again. And again, and he told us in the locker room at the swimming pool, and at the restaurant when we went to dinner, and four times this morning. He's in a pull up today and it's been dry all day - including a whole trip to the hardware store.

I am not counting any chickens yet, no way Jose. But F's suddenly all stoked about sticker charts, underwear, flushing, the whole kit and kaboodle. I'm SO excited to see a light in the tunnel of endless diapers!

Aches and Pains

After a brief stint trying to get it worked out in Perth, I'm now more than two months into physical therapy and treatment for my shoulder here in Denver. I'm finally starting to make a little progress, but most days it's hard to tell as some part of my shoulder, neck, back is still in so much pain I can't pick things up or lift much over a couple pounds (forget a nearly 40lb toddler the size of a four year old).

Good news, we're narrowing in on the shoulder stuff. Rotator cuff is tweaked, due to a bone spur, tendonitits, and ongoing bursitis, the latter I learned of in Perth. Bad news, my neck/back are in a lot of pain - probably more than before. Worse news, I'm still not allowed to do any real physical activity which is pretty darn annoying - no swimming, working out, barely just walking really, and only that at a mellow pace so I don't tense up. Anything other than resistance strengthening for my shoulder, and even that sometimes, creates spasms in my neck and back which set everything right back to the beginning. That bad cold I had a few weeks ago came with a nasty cough which locked up my neck so I couldn't look right again. That put a damper on my physical therapy, I had to back off even the resistance exercises until my neck unlocked. Locked up neck/back = no shoulder strengthening exercises allowed = weak shoulder = part of the problem (plus the big bone spur that's rubbing, but hey, you know, - just gotta be TOUGH!)

Bone spur: you can see how a pointy bone where it's not supposed to be might hurt.
Bursa in your shoulder: mine's inflamed and so is swollen, taking up more room than it should and causing even more joint pain in addition to the bone spur.
I got another steroid injection into my shoulder last week, in a new location, and it seems to be working much better than previous injections. The upside to this is that it means an easy arthroscopic surgery could fix one of the big shoulder issues, my rotator cuff pain. The MRI on my neck didn't show much, according to the orthopedist, but I'm in so much pain there's got to be something going on.

With all the Dr/MRI/follow up and misc other appointments I've had to take time off from going in to PT because there just aren't enough days in the week when you have to be home in time for 2.5 year old's afternoon naps. I'll get back in to see them this week and see what they can do to ease some of the neck/back pain so I can work on the shoulder some more. Hopefully soon we'll get a break, we all get the feeling it's one big puzzle and as soon as we find the right piece it'll all start to fall into place.

Out of Oz -> Into Mile High

You could also call this post "Consolidation", because for the first time in nearly four years, most of our worldly possessions are not only on the same continent, but in the same house. (I say "most" because I have a small stash of top-quality good stuff that has been resident in San Juan County for a couple of decades now. It is working its way to the Front Range bit by bit, but it has never really been in our Denver orbit, so that smallish pile notwithstanding, all the rest of our stuff is all here).

Our household effects departed Perth the first week of December 2009 and arrived in Denver the first week of February 2010 - less than 9 weeks in transit. Not bad for a 12,000 mile trip in a steel box.

Stats:
- Sole-use (only our stuff) modular sea container - 1x 20-foot
- Volume: 24 cubic meters
- Volume actually used: 15 cubic meters
- Time to wrap, pack and load stuff: 3 guys, most of a day.
- Trajectory: From Perth to port at Freemantle by truck. From Freo to Singapore by ship. Change onto another ship for Los Angeles. Hang out in Customs for a while. Train from LA to Denver. Truck to domicile.
- Time to unload, move into house, and partially unpack: 2 guys, one morning.
- Hooray! Everything made it, no noteworthy breakage.

Here are some photos of loading up in Perth just before the height of summer, and unloading in Denver 8 weeks later in mid winter.



The movers did a teriffic job, and we'd cheerfully use them again.
Drop us a line if you ever need any import/export advice.

Travis

D's Hat

I haven't had much time to knit lately, but I did manage to cobble together a hat for my friend Deb. I knit it too fast. I was doing so in an attempt to get it out to her before winter is over and it's too warm for her to need it, and so made more mistakes than I'm happy about. However, I loved the pattern and will knit it again. It's free on Ravelry!


Deb, if you want another, less mistake filled hat, I'll knit one for you in time for NEXT winter. Yes, NEXT winter. Any color you want.

Divine Smells

I'm learning to bake (good) bread. And it makes our house smell YUUUUUMMMMYYY. Before we went overseas I had a couple of years of attempts, but no great successes with homemade breads (the years of mediocre to bad bread). Now I've found the right combo of recipes and altitude adjustments, things are grooving around here. I'm all for the ease and convenience of store bread, and I still buy buns for the sausages and hot dogs we love to eat around here, but recently I learned that in addition to the loads of extra stuff bread just doesn't need, some manufacturers add SCENT to their packaging to make their bread more appealing. Seriously? So now about once a week I bake a loaf of sandwich bread and about once a week I bake something fun.

This week we're using up apples. Travis' mom and her friend Ruth Ann stopped here for a couple of days on their way to their next adventure (Egypt) and brought a heap of perishables, including what seems like an entire bushel of apples. I knew if I baked a pie Travis would eat one piece and the rest of the pie would just sit and fester, wilting away while we all just passed it over for less sweet snacks. Lo and behold, a recipe for Apple Challah. This, I think, will get eaten.
Based on Travis' reaction while it was baking, and his hovering as I pulled it out of the oven, I don't expect it to linger!

My Favorite Superbowl Commercial

My favorite Superbowl commercial didn't even air here in Denver. But it did star a person who's very popular here in our household. In fact FFM calls her nearly everyday on his play cell phone. Aunt Karen's been busy lately and has been getting a lot of commercial work. So far she's been in ads for a casino, Cold Stone, Hyatt, and this one is an Arizona homebuilder.

http://www.fultonhomes.com/pages/superbowl_ad.aspx

This ad aired in Arizona during the Superbowl and Uncle Q sent a link so the rest of us could watch it. Aunt Karen stars as "Substandard House" (one of the green and white ones) and it's easiest to spot her as the house with the longest name. She filmed this right before we visited them in Phoenix at Thanksgiving and regaled us with stories of trying to run in giant shoes, trying to catch and throw a football with giant white hands, and getting tackled.

Way better than all those Bud and Doritos ads we got here. Way to go Karen!

The Wrong Car

We are having dramas.

While there are a lot of big decisions Travis and I can make while living on two continents, discussing merits of new couches, TVs, even houses and school districts, etc over Skype, there are two things I can't decide and buy without him physically being here. 1) hard backed chairs 2) a car. For those items he's just got to be here in person so we can make sure his lanky, well over 6' frame will fit.

So, I did months of research, went to a timely autoshow in Phoenix over Thanksgiving and sat in what seemed like every reasonable vehicle there, made a spreadsheet, and narrowed the field. Upon his arrival in Denver all we had to do was test drive, agree we both liked it, and make sure he fit comfortably (a big vehicle doesn't always mean he'll fit, he fits in my little sports car but you can't cram him in a Hummer with a spatula).

So we picked our vehicle and decided on the features that are the most important to us. It turns out these features are pretty unique, and not part of the standard packages dealers have on their lots. We hemmed and hawed, and sat down to talk with our moms who have been kindly loaning their cars to us. We're currently a one car family, except when Travis' mom is out gallivanting the globe and leaves her car here for minding. My car, which is the aforementioned sporty car, doesn't go in the snow, so it's been living at my mom's house and she's loaned us her four wheel drive (our 1 car right now) during this unusually snowy winter.

Both moms, in that motherly way, assured us that we should go ahead and keep borrowing the car(s) for another 6-8 weeks while we ordered and waited for the delivery of our custom built car, with exactly the options we wanted on it. Keep in mind I'd already BEEN borrowing my mom's car since the first big snowstorm in October! Travis' mom left her car here for three weeks in Dec/Jan while she was away and now has left it again for three weeks while she's gone again.

We wait...and wait...and wait. The car manufacturing plant shuts down for two weeks at Christmas....

Then we get word the car is on it's way, hooray! I tell my mom her car will return soon! Our car broker, Debi, arranges her man to come in on his day off to put the clear bra on. She tells us we can come on Saturday afternoon to pick it up. We're thrilled. Travis and I show up at the dealer with a bounce in our step, Debi takes us out to look at our new car, she hands me the keys. It's shiny, it's red, it's just like we wanted. I climb in, breathe in that great smell, look up at the sunroof FFM and I really wanted, Travis and I sit in the comfy front seats and then peer into the back....

The rear seats are all wrong.

We'd ordered a bench seat and they'd installed captain chairs.

Ugh.

This was the whole big deal from the very beginning, The sunroof/bench seat combo was the hard one to find. The sunroof/captain chair combo is sitting on a car lot somewhere and could have been shipped in, we could have had it two months ago. Debi's annoyed. She calls the guy at the dealership who placed the order (who is at home on his day off) hoping that maybe they just sent over the wrong car. There is silence at his end of the phone. He realized he made a mistake and ordered the wrong car.

Ugh. Ugh. UGH!

Word for now is that we'll probably have to wait another 6-8 weeks. We discussed just taking the car that's here, but we'll have this car for a long time and I'm a bit of a car geek. I want the RIGHT car. I don't want to be annoyed by some dumb BIG mistake in our car for the next 5, 7, 10 years. We'll know for sure on Monday if there's not someway to put a rush on it.

One For the Little People

25 minutes and 49 seconds.

That's how long I was on hold today waiting to cancel a credit card. Flipping back and forth between continents and currencies we've got extra credit cards that now just sit around doing nothing. Several years ago I canceled one, Discover, since we couldn't ever use it outside of the US. It took about 6 minutes. On the slate for today, cancelling another that just sent a letter about a new annual fee.

I called up credit card from Big Bank X and had a pretty short wait time to talk to a real person, less than five minutes. We chatted about my credit card needs and why I wanted to cancel. So far pretty straightforward and it was at this point that Discover simply cancelled my card. However Big Bank X informed me that I needed to talk to a Customer Representative Manager and therefore would need to hold. OK, say I, they don't seem busy, my last hold time was short, and it's nice and quiet around here at my house since it's nap time. I'll hold. 25 minutes and 49 seconds later, after hearing "Please hold for the next available Customer Representative Manager" every 15 seconds, I got a real person.

I don't have a speaker phone. I wish I did. I could have been folding laundry. I did, however manage to do some one handed unpacking and am glad my phone is at least cordless. I'm glad I was able to use my land line and not use up nearly half an hour of shared family minutes on a pointless hold that I'm positive was banking psychological warfare intended to make me hang up so I wouldn't cancel my card.

Take that Big Bank. You're not paying for bonuses out an annual fee from ME this year! ;)

Quote of the Day

"Mommy's eyes are orange!"

A little background here - Travis keeps telling FFM he's got to wear his sunnies because his eyes are blue. I just ask him to please wear his sunnies because it's bright, but Travis is right, it's extra important for blue-eyed people to protect their eyes from the sun.

So all of sudden FFM's become really interested in the color of everyone's eyes. And I guess yesterday mine were orange (they're really brown, which he does know).

Getting our Moneys Worth

I took FFM in for a developmental assessment today. FFM was a bit slow to talk back in the day and our pediatrician in Perth suggested that we check in with a speech therapist when we returned to the US. She proposed waiting since the wait for one in Australia would put us at our return date anyway. In the meantime his vocabulary exploded and while he's still sometimes hard to understand (when he's tired or excited) his new pediatrician thought while he probably didn't really need it we should go ahead and do it. She's actually a pretty good doc and said, well, if his doctor who knew him well thought he should be screened, let's do it. Plus it's done through a program associated with the school district so let's use that program all your tax dollars go to pay for.

The assessment covers the whole she-bang, from speech, to cognitive ability, to gross and fine motor skills. It involved lots of paperwork and annoying stuff beforehand on my part (I mentioned it's funded by taxes, see?) but all in all seemed well worth it. We learned a lot today from three therapists that all sat down on the floor and played with FFM.

Turns out his speech is just fine, he's right where he should be, and even using some sounds ahead of schedule. All that practice we've been doing has paid off. We got some exercises to do at home so he can learn to say 'F', it's a consonant that normally comes later in the scheme of speech but since it's the first letter of his name the therapist thought he/we might like him to be able to say it a little sooner.

His cognitive abilities are great, too. The psychologist had nothing but great things to tell us, that FFM's way ahead of schedule, when she described what she found. It made me sit up a little straighter and feel those millions of questions we've fielded and thousands of stories we've read and hundreds of games we've played are worth it.

Oh, and gross motor. Well, he's got some work to do. He's cautious. He'll do the skills but will compensate. Hmmm. Probably my fault, I say. He doesn't like to go up onto things without holding on to something (like stairs, stepping over a toy). And he'll jump with two feet off the ground but only if he's doing something funny with his arms (I missed this part, they were out in the hall). And he's a bit timid (physically, not socially). I've noticed this at playgrounds recently, even more so than when we were in Oz, when Mac and Lexie would go charging all over play structures and FFM wouldn't be quite so sure about some new part of a playground.

So we'll go back again and they'll play some more. Since he's been 100% healthy, i.e. no chronic ear infections, no one's really very concerned at this point, it'll be interesting to see what happens. I'm glad to see our tax dollars at work.